Synopsis
The line which separates good from evil maybe thinner than what we believe.
MARIANA (40) has been married over 10 years to PEDRO (45), a brilliant, workaholic economist. She is going through a constant crisis : she lacks self confidence as she has always been treated like a child by her father and then her husband. In addition to her insecurity, she is under social pressure to have children : in her bourgeois bubble, motherhood is essential and affects the image of men’s virility. With a feeling of guilt, she agrees to follow an IVF treatment.
At the Equestrian Club where her friend ANTONIA (42) is celebrating her son’s birthday, she meets JUAN (70), a riding instructor and former colonel with a suspicious and dark past. Mariana starts taking horseback riding lessons.This sudden hobby is not of the taste of the dominant men around her, neither her father nor Pedro. Mariana and the colonel develop an intimate relationship. His military rectitude mixed with the gentle care he shows for her create a sexual trouble she had forgotten since long. She furthermore creates some awkward connection with her horse which enables her to recover the sensuality and the self confidence she lacked.
Besides horseback riding, Mariana’s everyday life is quite superficial, working at an art gallery and organizing dinners for her husband and his friends. Her own friends don ́t care about much except for their comfort.
One day, while at the riding club, JAVIER, (35) a police officer appears, looking for the colonel. He wants to talk to him about his past, about the time when he was the head of a torture center where hundreds of people died during the Pinochet dictatorship. This is how Mariana finds out that her beloved mentor has also the face of an executionner.
Uncertain of what to do with such a blow, she tells her husband and friends about it. She ́s immediately told to stop her lessons, a scandal of such caliber in unacceptable to Pedro. Not that he objects in any way to her mentor ́s past actions but he hates being in the spotlight and does not want a scandal to explode in his social circle.
Finally she refuses to abandon her passion for riding. She stands firm towards her surroundings and decides to stay close to her riding instructor until he goes to prison for life. Then she goes back to her everyday life, as if nothing happened.